Talking to the Crowd

We hold the power of the world in our hands through Social Media – But we must have a plan!

“Talking to the Crowd” is the subject of my 45 minute keynote presentation as well as the focus of my interaction with business and enterprise.

Here are a random sampling of facts which illustrate why your business is out of touch with the modern economy if you are not connected and engaging in Social Media:

It took radio 38 years to reach 50 million users, it took the internet just 4 years. Facebook went to 50 million in 3 years and then to 350 million in less than 24 months.

Social Media users spend 17.5 hours a week on social media sites.

The 100 million businesses in the world are only generating 20% of the data on the internet. The remaining 80% is being generated by consumers (your customers) in personal engagement. Now THAT is a conversation worth being part of!

5 of the worlds top 10 most visited sites are social networking sites (with Facebook at # 1).

These figures will grow exponentially as access to the internet becomes faster, easier and cheaper.

In short social media has become the dominant form of communication and because of this consumers have formed tight networks of people that they consider to be “just like me”. And those networks are TRUSTED. Business and government are not. 90% of consumers say they trust social media recommendations. Only 14% trust advertising.

Consumers are hungry for engagement with your company and your product and the modern economy demands that you be there.

To say that “crowd sourcing” is the future of business is to state a fact whose time is already here. The good news is that this is the easiest train to catch. It is not difficult to catch up – all it requires is a start and a little guidance and before long any business or enterprise will be among the crowd with the best of them.